Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Statewide PA | Transco | Williams
Transco Loses Bid to Change Court for REAE Pipeline Challenge
In March, environmental radical Pat McDonnell of PennFuture, the former Pennsylvania Secretary of the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), along with his best friend THE Delaware Riverkeeper, Maya van Rossum, sued McDonnell’s former agency over permits the DEP issued to Williams to build the Regional Energy Access Expansion (REAE) project (see PennFuture Appeals DEP Permits for Transco Northeast Expansion Proj). Williams tried to get the venue of the court challenge changed, but the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania denied that request in a ruling issued Monday.
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Williams, one of the largest pipeline companies in the world, issued its first quarter update yesterday. The company reported 1Q23 net income increased by $547 million to $926 million, up from $379 million in 1Q22 due to unrealized gains (and losses) on commodity derivatives, the benefit of higher service revenues driven by contributions from recent acquisitions, increased volumes at Ohio Valley Midstream, as well as higher commodity marketing margins. CEO and President Alan Armstrong said, “We remain squarely focused on our natural gas-focused strategy.” The Marcellus/Utica plays a big part in the company’s gas-focused strategy.
Yesterday the Bidenistas at the Dept. of (In)Justice (DOJ) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a “settlement” (i.e. bullying) with three pipeline companies–Williams, MPLX, and Kerr-McGee Gathering. The settlement requires the three to pay a combined $9.25 million in civil penalties and make improvements at 25 gas processing plants and 91 compressor stations in 12 states, including Ohio and West Virginia, worth another $16 million. The two federal agencies claimed the pipeline companies were violating federal and state clean air laws related to leak detection and repair (LDAR) requirements for natural gas processing plants at various facilities they own and operate across the country.
Environmental radical Pat McDonnell of PennFuture, the former Pennsylvania Secretary of the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), along with his best friend THE Delaware Riverkeeper, Maya van Rossum, have just sued McDonnell’s former agency over permits the DEP issued to Williams to build the Regional Energy Access Expansion (REAE) project (see 
We have an update to a project we first told you about in June of last year called the Southside Reliability Enhancement Project (see 
As we have been reporting, CERAWeek, the world’s premier energy conference, is happening all this week in Houston, Texas. On Tuesday, Bloomberg reporters filed a roundup/overview of happenings at the event. Below is the roundup from Day Two of CERAWeek, which includes a comment by EQT CEO Toby Rice, who said he believes the natural gas market will come back into balance in the “middle half” of this year as production adjusts (i.e., less drilling) following the recent precipitous collapse in prices.
Why would a major pipeline company (or driller) decide to cede control of the future of its company to a group of international leftists hellbent on destroying fossil energy? The answer eludes us, but it has just happened again. Yesterday, pipeline giant Williams, which owns and operates (among other major assets) the Transco Pipeline system, announced it had joined the UN’s Oil & Gas Methane Partnership 2.0 (OGMP 2.0). Support for OGMP 2.0 is growing in the natgas marketplace in the U.S. We previously told you that Cheniere Energy’s LNG export plants are seeking certification under OGMP 2.0 (see 
A little over a month ago, MDN brought you the good news that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has approved the Williams Regional Energy Access Expansion (REAE) project, a plan to beef up the Transco pipeline in Pennsylvania and New Jersey to deliver an extra 829 MMcf/d of Marcellus gas to PA, NJ, and Maryland (see 
Here’s a question: What are the 15 biggest (by company revenue) natural gas-owning pipeline companies in the world? The U.S. has the biggest natural gas pipeline infrastructure in the world, covering a distance of 333,000 kilometers (206,917 miles). Even so, only one U.S.-based company is in the top 5 biggest pipeline companies. Can you guess which country takes the top 2 spots on the list?
Alan Armstrong, the CEO of pipeline giant Williams (which has MAJOR pipeline assets in the Marcellus/Utica), delivered a talk yesterday in the company’s hometown of Tulsa, Oklahoma, to a group at the University of Tulsa. Summarizing his talk, Armstrong said we can have lower emissions right now. The way to do it is with natural gas. The problem is, of course, nobody can get a new pipeline for natural gas permitted anymore. The government, and lawsuits, are blocking new pipeline projects. The system of permitting needs to get “straightened out” according to Armstrong. Put another way, the system is BROKEN.
In March 2019, MDN told you about a new Williams plan to beef up the Transco pipeline in Pennsylvania and New Jersey to deliver an extra 829 MMcf/d of Marcellus gas to PA, NJ, and Maryland (see 
We spotted an op-ed appearing on The Hill website running under the title, “Natural gas and permitting reform are critical to a clean energy future.” The article was written by Chad Zamarin, board chairman for the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America (INGAA) and senior vice president of corporate strategic development for pipeline giant Williams. In the op-ed, Zamarin defends natural gas against false claims that methane and pipelines are “obsolete and environmentally detrimental.” He states flatly that natural gas “must be part of a low-carbon energy future.”
Last Thursday, residents who live near a natural gas compressor station in Brooke County, WV, asked WV Dept. of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) officials to address pollution and noise from the facility before recommending it for a permit from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The facility is owned by Appalachian Midstream Services, LLC, which we discovered (after a great amount of digging) is a subsidiary of Williams. Nearby residents from both WV and Pennsylvania (which is located a few hundred feet away) showed up to ask questions about, and point out problems with, the Mountaineer Compressor Station, which has been online since March 2021. The compressor is also located less than five miles from the border of Ohio (the northern Panhandle area of WV).